NEH Seminar - Prospectus
2008 NEH SEMINAR FOR SCHOOL TEACHERS
HISTORICAL INTERPRETATIONS OF THE INDUSTRIAL
REVOLUTION IN BRITAIN
At the University of Nottingham
Gerard M. Koot
Dear Colleagues:
Thanks for your interest in the five-week seminar on interpretations of the Industrial Revolution in Britain, sponsored by the National Endowment for the Humanities and the University of Massachusetts Dartmouth, which I will direct at the University of Nottingham, England, from June 30 to August 1, 2008. Since our approach will be interdisciplinary, I hope to attract participants with a wide variety of backgrounds and interests, including those interested in the arts, literature, history, economics, and political science. In addition to full-time K-12 teachers and librarians, administrators who also teach are welcome to apply.
The topic and its importance
The purpose of this NEH Summer Seminar is to develop a critical appreciation for the experience of industrialization in Britain, the historiography of the subject, and the lasting influence these interpretations have had on cultural values. We will study contemporary accounts and seminal interpretations. We will also visit some of the places that experienced the first industrial revolution. The seminar will allow participants to explore an important subject in some depth, to appreciate the interdisciplinary nature of humanistic studies, to explore connections between the texts and material culture, and to do so in an atmosphere conducive to collegiality, study and reflection.
I chose the subject of the industrial revolution because of its intrinsic importance, the richness of its historiography and material remains, my familiarity with the field, and its prominence in school curricula. Moreover, I believe that the concept of the human passage from a traditional and agrarian society to an urban and industrial one is central to many of the ambiguities in modern society and even in our own personal lives. Many of our deepest convictions about philosophy, religion, personal and social values were inherited from a pre-industrial past and often fit uneasily into our industrial present. Yet, at the same time, modern industrial society has provided us with benefits few would abandon. As human beings, consciously or unconsciously, our view of the historical experience of industrialization continues to influence our culture. It is the working assumption of this seminar that, as humanists, we should not leave this crucial subject to be studied only by social scientists, such as economists, but should examine it within the broader framework of humanistic scholarship.
There exists a rich body of writing on British industrialization and a wealth of physical evidence in England illustrating its nature and its consequences. It was the industrial revolution in Britain that first transformed the West and challenged the very existence of traditional societies around the world. Britain's industrial revolution took place within a capitalist framework and it occurred in a society that has made a special contribution to the development of constitutional government. Both factors have a particular relevance to our own history. Whether one interprets the origin of industrial capitalism in Britain as a tribute to the genius of free human beings, or as the enslavement of the human spirit to Western materialism and imperialism, or as something in between, it remains one of the crucial contributions of the West to the world's historical development.
Reading
We will approach our subject through a brief introductory text, contemporary accounts--including poetry and a novel, five of the most influential 20th century historical studies, and visits to important historical sites in England. While the required reading list may appear formidable for a five-week seminar, several of the works are short and thus the total common reading will be about 1350 pages. We will send the required reading to you in early May (see the section on costs, below).
As an introduction to our subject, we will first read and discuss a brief but excellent current overview by Kenneth Morgan, The Birth of Industrial Britain: Social Change 1750-1850 (2004). We will then study selections from contemporary accounts by both critics and admirers of industrialization, such as Daniel Defoe, Arthur Young, William Cobbett and others. We will study the classic early 19th century debate between a conservative poet, Robert Southey, and a liberal historian and essayist, Thomas Babington Macaulay, in brief selections from Southey's writings and in Macaulay's essay, "Southey's Colloquies" (1830). We will also read selected poetry by William Blake and William Wordsworth (photocopies of contemporary selections will be supplied) and examine visual images by artists of the period. You will also find an extensive selection of primary source material, both printed and visual images, on the seminar's web site at www.umassd.edu/ir. The final contemporary work we will study is Charles Dickens' classic and influential novel Hard Times (1854).
All the other works to be analyzed are 20th century interpretations. We will discuss John L. and Barbara Hammond, The Town Labourer: The New Civilization, 1760-1832 (1917). This is the most important contribution to the critical, or pessimistic, interpretation of the social consequences of industrialization in the first half of the 20th century by two well-known liberal reformers. Next we will evaluate T. S. Ashton, The Industrial Revolution, 1760-1830 (1948, 1997 ed.). This essay, by a British 'liberal' economic historian, offers a much more optimistic interpretation of industrialization's social consequences. Next, we will study Industry and Empire (1969, 2nd ed. 1999) by the noted British socialist historian, E. J. Hobsbawm. We will supplement Hobsbawm's emphasis on the role of international trade and Empire in the origin of British industrialization with several scholarly articles on this theme, which has recently re-emerged within the context of a contemporary debate about economic growth and globalization. Reflecting an important shift in modern historiography toward a more inclusive social history of industrialization, we will discuss Louise A. Tilly and Joan W. Scott, Women, Work and Family (1978, 1987 rev. ed.). Finally, the seminar will examine recent scholarship on our subject through Maxine Berg's influential study, The Age of Manufactures, 1700-1820: Industry, Innovation and Work in Britain (2nd ed., 1994), and several recent seminal articles on the role of consumption in spawning the first industrial revolution. Berg emphasizes the complex relationships between social history, economic history and the history of technology to offer us an account of the period that sees an intricate web of improvement and decline, large and small scale production, and machine and hand processes that created the new and revolutionary market society. Her study integrates important recent scholarship on the work of children and women into the story of British industrialization as well as the role of a widespread and growing demand for luxury goods from a global eighteenth century world economy.
Museum and site visits
We will bring to life the people, social context, technology and material reality of industrialization in Britain by visiting historical sites and museums in England. Pictures of many of the sites are available at www.umassd.edu/ir. Nottingham, situated in the East Midlands, is an excellent location in which to visualize and explore the experience of industrialization. While the city played an important role in England's industrialization and contains museums and other physical evidence that illustrates this role, it has escaped much of the industrial blight that characterizes some other pioneering English industrial cities and is surrounded by lovely countryside. On our way to visit important industrial history sites in the Midlands and the North of England, we will see evidence of the "rose covered cottages" and ancient field and village patterns that Southey and Macaulay sparred about nearly two hundred years ago. As we pass the grim stone mills and housing of industrial towns set within green valleys, we will understand more clearly the reality of Dickens' Coketown and the scale of the transformation that industrialization brought to Britain.
With the expert guidance of Mr. Haydon Luke, a retired teacher of English and Headmaster at a secondary school, and now a museum and educational consultant, we will make day trips on four Wednesdays and one three-day trip by chartered coach. First, we will concentrate on the early textile industry and the wealth produced by English agriculture. We will visit the world's first successful water-powered cotton spinning mill, Richard Arkwright's 1771 mill in Cromford, which has been partially restored and figures prominently in several of our texts. Located in the rural Derwent Valley, the complex required the construction of a factory town to house its workers. Cromford still retains much of the housing built between 1770 and 1840 as well as the millpond, sluices, and canals. In the afternoon we will observe the village and field patterns of an enclosed agricultural countryside and contrast it with the extensive grazing lands of the Derbyshire hills as we travel up the valley to Chatsworth. This spectacular country house, garden, and park, paid for by agricultural wealth, will give us a sense of a great 18th century estate and the contrasting lives of the aristocracy and the common people.
The second trip will take us to the most important industrial archeology site in Britain, Ironbridge Gorge. During the 18th century the Derby family exploited the rich mineral resources of the Severn gorge to smelt iron with coke and spanned the river with the world's first iron bridge. The bridge still stands and the "Ironbridge" Gorge Museums have restored, recreated and interpreted the area's industrial history at several sites, including mining, smelting, forging, and pottery operations.
On the third trip, we will study early metallurgy and textile sites. In Sheffield we will visit the Abbeydale Industrial Hamlet's 18th century steel-making and water-powered tool workshops and then contrast this early rural industry site with a visit to the city's industrial museum, located in the heart of Sheffield's old manufacturing center, to see the largest operating steam engine in Europe go through its paces. Crossing the Pennines, where we will see an excellent example of the landscape that provided the waterpower that drove Britain's early industry, we will visit the National Trust's Quarry Mill Bank. This is the best-preserved water driven textile mill in Britain and features dozens of operating spinning and weaving machines. We will also visit its Apprentice House, used to house Poor Law children who worked in the mill, and the adjacent model village of Styal, built in the early 19th century for the mill's workers.
On our fourth day trip we will go to Manchester, one of Britain's premier industrial cities during the 19th century. We will visit the Greater Manchester Museum of Science and Industry. Part of the museum is housed in the oldest surviving passenger railroad station in the world. In addition to a large collection of working stationary steam engines and other industrial revolution era technology exhibits, the museum offers superb displays illustrating Manchester's efforts to deal with its explosive growth during the 19th century, including an extensive underground walk featuring the building of its sewage and water systems. The nearby Pump House offers the best display of artifacts on Chartism and labor history in Britain. Finally we will walk through the city center to view important 19th century buildings, such as the Town Hall and the Free Trade Hall, and visit the City Art Gallery, which features a superb collection of late 18th and 19th century British art that illustrates the themes of our seminar.
In addition to these four day-trips, we will make a Wednesday to Friday trip to Yorkshire and the Northeast to study mining, early railroads and steel making. On Wednesday and Thursday night we will stay at Durham University's St. Aiden's College, which is within walking distance of Durham's magnificent cathedral. On our way north and just outside of Nottingham, we will visit D. H. Lawrence's birthplace in the mining town of Eastwood (Bestwood in his novels). In South Yorkshire, we will tour the National Mining Museum and descend into a deep mining pit for a guided walk by retired mineworkers. At Darlington in the Northeast, we will visit the original station for Britain's first railway line, the Stockton & Darlington. The museum houses George Stephenson's original steam locomotive. We will also visit Causey Arch in Tanfield, the oldest surviving railway bridge in the world. It was built in 1725 to carry coal on wooden rails to the river Tyne for shipment. In Weardale, we will visit the Nenthead and Killhope Lead mining site and museum. The site includes a huge water wheel that drives crushing machinery as well as a fascinating mine walk. Across the dales in Ebchester, we will visit the Derwentcote steel furnace. Built in the 18th century, it is Britain's earliest and most complex steel making furnace to have survived intact. In Beamish, we will visit the North of England's Open Air Museum. This extensive museum contains many interesting industrial era buildings and sites, such as a colliery, workshops, a railway yard, early electric trams, and a home farm with 19th century machinery. The housing, shops, school and chapel in its town center are furnished as they might have appeared in an industrial neighborhood in 1913. The material culture portrayed in the town center offers a vivid picture of a working-class and lower-middle class industrial society during the very period when traditional interpretations of the industrial revolution became an important ideological foundation for twentieth century social-democratic politics in Britain's traditional industrial regions. Since our guide has excellent connections in English museum circles, we will benefit from special presentations and tours by museum staff at most sites.
Questions to be raised:
We will seek to use the reading and site visits to ask broad interpretive questions. Why did our authors choose to write about the industrial revolution? Why did they emphasize some topics and neglect others? How does the physical evidence help us understand issues raised by the texts? What kind of sources did the authors use and how did they use them? We will also ask larger questions such as: What can these texts tell us about the nature of the historical discipline? What contributions have literature, economics, sociology and industrial archeology made to our understanding of the experience of industrialization? Why do the humanistic interpretations tend to be pessimistic while those of the social scientists appear much more optimistic? Is it possible that interpretations of the industrial revolution have been not just the scribbling of obscure scholars and of anonymous teachers in countless school and college classrooms, but have exerted, and continue to exert, a powerful influence on the shaping of an historical consciousness and public policy? While it is often said that historical scholarship is about the past, does our analysis of interpretations of the industrial revolution suggest that for many historians its real purpose was about the construction of a usable past to influence society's future prospects?
My background, qualifications, and context of the seminar in my work
The interpretation of the industrial revolution in Britain has been central to my teaching and research. I directed six previous NEH seminars on the British Industrial Revolution at the University of Nottingham that received excellent evaluations from the participants while I found them to be the most rewarding professional activities of my career. Born in The Netherlands, I came to the United States as a young teenager and maintained an interest in matters European. As an undergraduate I studied history and economics with a particular interest in the relationship between the developed and less developed world. In graduate school I concentrated on the history of the British Isles with a special interest in intellectual history and the history of economic thought. I have more than thirty years of experience teaching a wide variety of courses and seminars in British and Modern European history with an emphasis on economic and intellectual history, the history of European women, and historiography. While I teach a variety of students, I especially enjoy working with teachers in our Master of Arts in Teaching program. As a scholar, I have concentrated on the connections between economic ideas, economic history, politics and society in modern Britain. I have held several research fellowships, produced a number of scholarly articles, presented scholarly papers, and published a book, English Historical Economics, 1870-1926: The Rise of Economic History and Neomercantilism (Cambridge University Press: 1987). I am currently doing research on the relationship between empire, international trade and industrialization.
As both a teacher and scholar, I have become skeptical of the ever-increasing specialization in both scholarship and teaching. I find it particularly troubling that economists increasingly ignore history and that historians and humanists too readily neglect economic ideas. While most contemporary economic historians, particularly those with a statistical and theoretical bent, now agree that many of the earlier interpretations of the industrial revolution were too cataclysmic and pessimistic, they have not yet been able to convince historians as a whole, or the culture at large, of the validity of their interpretation. Within contemporary culture the British industrial revolution continues to conjure up a picture of dark satanic mills, urban squalor, poverty, greed, and an uncaring government dominated by a class and ideology that put the interests of some individuals before the well-being of the community. Regardless of one's views about the experience of industrialization and the nature of economic ideals, to say nothing of disputes about economic policy, these topics are far too important and interesting to leave to the economists and social scientists. In my teaching career, I have found that the thorough and sympathetic discussion of some of the most influential interpretations of the crucial process of industrialization offers an excellent opportunity for humanists to reflect on some of the central concerns shared by economists and social scientists.
Seminar Organization and Optional Academic Credit
Our seminar will be organized to foster a comfortable and collegial intellectual atmosphere that will emphasize the raising of broad and significant questions. The formal seminar meetings will from 9:00 a.m. to noon, with a break for coffee, Mondays, Tuesdays and Thursdays. The all-day field trips will be on four Wednesdays and the trip to the Northeast will be scheduled from Wednesday through Friday afternoon during the fourth week. The seminar meetings will be devoted to a wide-ranging discussion of the issues raised by the readings and site visits. My role will be to organize the seminar, to encourage discussion, to listen, to comment, and to help you with your preparation. It will not be a lecture course but a seminar in which everyone participates. I will be available to meet with individuals or small groups on seminar meeting days from 1:00 to 2:00 and informally at lunch, for walks and in the pub in the evening. Participants will form into five cooperative learning groups. Each group will take turns leading the discussion on the texts to be discussed, present information and context for the authors, provide material on related topics and engage the seminar in a variety of learning strategies. Ample collateral reading is available for reference in the Nottingham University library. As an historian and teacher I have found that the process of writing is crucial to learning. Each participant will be asked to keep a journal in which to record daily reactions to the reading and discussions. A few participants will be asked to share these reactions during each meeting. Each participant will write two essays (about a thousand words), or work on one larger project, on chosen seminar texts or topics. These essays may be either interpretive or research essays. Essays might deal with the participant's reaction to a particular text studied, the relationship between texts and material sites, the wider issues raised by our discussion, or a particular research interest. Essays will be discussed within each cooperative learning group. I will read and comment on all essays. After returning the essays to participants, for revision if desired, I will publish them on our web-site www.umassd.edu/ir. This web site will also serve as a convenient communication device before and after the seminar and provides resources for the teaching of the subject in the schools.
Should you wish to use your participation in this NEH summer seminar for in-service or graduate credit, I will be happy to send a letter to your school for in-service credit explaining the work you did in the seminar. If you wish, I can register you for three graduate credits in History at the University of Massachusetts Dartmouth. The latter will require you to complete a research paper for the seminar and make a modest payment to UMass Dartmouth for administrative fees.
Accommodations, Costs, University Facilities
The University of Nottingham is a medium size institution situated on a large American style campus of mostly modern buildings in a park setting of lawns and gardens overlooking the river Trent. Included is an ornamental lake where rowboats may be hired. For pictures see www.umassd.edu/ir. It is situated in an attractive residential section of Nottingham. Accommodations, as well as our seminar and dining rooms, will be in Rutland Hall. Rutland Hall is a traditional dormitory arranged around an internal courtyard. It is surrounded by open-space and adjacent to an extensive University sports complex, which includes a pool and exercise equipment to which you will have access. The Hall is a five to ten minute walk from the University Library and other campus facilities. The housing available offers standard British university dormitory accommodations. All accommodations are in single occupancy rooms, which include a washbasin and a telephone. Towels and linens are provided. Bath and toilet facilities are in close proximity. There are several kitchens with a range, refrigerator, and teakettle. Rutland Hall has a TV room and a licensed bar. There are coin operated laundry machines available. There will be rooms available for visiting guests at Bed and Breakfast rates. Participants in previous seminars have found communal living and dining arrangements a crucial benefit of the seminar experience.
My experience also tells me that you will not go hungry (previous participants have found the meals quite good). Breakfast and lunch are served in the large dining room while dinner will be served in our own private dining room. Menus are quite varied, extensive and include vegetarian options. For our three-day trip to the Northeast we will stay in single bedrooms in a modern residence hall at St. Aiden's College, Durham University. Meals included for the seminar are a full English breakfast everyday; dinner from Sundays through Thursday evenings; a full lunch on Mondays, Tuesdays and Thursdays; and a packed lunch on trip days. In addition, mid morning coffee or juice will be included on seminar days. Meals not provided can be purchased on campus as well as at nearby pubs and restaurants. Two bank branches, a convenience store, and bookshops are located on campus. There is a clinic on campus as well as a large university hospital adjacent.
As you are probably aware, the decline of the US dollar has made an extended stay in Europe quite expensive. However, at current exchange rates (11/3/07), the stipend of $3600 provided by NEH to participants will cover all your housing and most meals. NEH funds will also pay for our field-trip travel expenses while in England. In addition, NEH funds will pay for the required books for the seminar. We will send these to you in early May. In planning budget travel in Britain, see the Victorian Research Web for guidance: http://www.victorianresearch.org/trip.html
Before your departure for England, I will mail you photocopied documents, the required books and a detailed syllabus. Participants will have reference use of Nottingham University's Hallward library. This is a research facility of over a million volumes housed in a modern building that offers excellent study space. Its resources in British economic and social history, and related areas, are particularly strong. Participants will also have access to the university library's electronic resources, including e-mail facilities. In addition, participants can consult the holdings at Nottingham's large municipal research library in the city center.
Nottingham, central England, and Extracurricular Activities
Since the participants, including the director, will be housed together, we hope to establish a collegial atmosphere conducive to both learning and relaxed interchange. On Monday evening, June 30, we will have a welcome dinner and social gathering. On the Thursday evening before our departure on Friday, August 1, we will enjoy a farewell dinner and party. There will be no required activities on Fridays (except on the fourth Friday when we will be in the Northeast) through Sundays although we will provide a common dinner on Sunday evenings.
The University is located three miles from the city center. There is frequent and excellent bus service between the city center and the university. Nottingham is a city of about 300,000 inhabitants located in the East Midlands. It contains a large castle, many Victorian buildings and a modern center. The castle houses an art museum, a municipal history museum, a museum of domestic arts and crafts, and a medieval castle complete with secret passages and the lore of Robin Hood. The city includes a large central market place, two large modern city center shopping malls, and a large pedestrian precinct with many historic buildings and small shops. The city has an excellent legitimate theater, a concert hall, and several cinemas. There are of course many good pubs. Closer to the subject of the seminar, Nottingham has a block of restored 19th century working class housing open to the public, a brewery museum, a well known lace center, a costume and textile museum, and an inland canal basin. The city has several large parks, including one across the street from the university, at the center of which is Wollaton Hall, which houses exhibits on the region's industrial and natural history, including operating steam engines. In the surrounding area one can visit numerous historic houses and gardens, including Byron's Newstead Abbey. The nearby countryside offers large country parks, such as Sherwood Forest, as well as towpaths for walking along the Trent.
A bit further afield, but easily reached on a day trip by train or bus, are the many miles of marked walking paths in the Derbyshire Peak District National Park and such historic cities as Lincoln, Southwell, and York with magnificent cathedrals. Also within easy reach are such interesting industrial cities, many of which have undergone significant revitalizations during the last two decades, such as Leicester, Birmingham, Manchester, Liverpool, Leeds, Sheffield, and Derby. All of these contain interesting buildings and museums illustrating the history of the region. Nottingham is one hour and thirty minutes by express train from London, two hours from Manchester or York, and an hour from Leeds.
Applications and Deadlines
Application information is included with this letter. Should you decide to apply to this seminar, your completed application should be postmarked no later than March 3, 2008, and should be addressed to me as follows:
Gerard M. KootHistory Department, NEH Seminar
University of Massachusetts Dartmouth
285 Old Westport Road
North Dartmouth, MA 02747
Perhaps the most important part of the seminar application is the essay that must be submitted as part of the application. This essay should include relevant personal and academic information; your reasons for applying to the seminar; your interest, both academic and personal, in the subject of the seminar; reasons for applying to the particular project; your qualifications to do the work of the seminar and make a contribution to it; and the relation of the seminar to your teaching and other career objectives. All selected applicants will be notified by April 1 and will receive a stipend of $3,600 for expenses. While the stipend will cover your basic seminar expenses in the UK, as explained above, you will have to make your own travel arrangements between the US and Nottingham. I will provide detailed directions from London and Manchester airports to Nottingham and Rutland Hall.
Should you be interested in applying to this seminar and have further questions, do not hesitate to get in touch with me. My e-mail address is gkoot@umassd.edu. You can also call me at my office (508 999-8305) or at home (508 994-3145). I look forward to your application and am confident that an interesting and varied group will spend five stimulating and pleasant weeks at Nottingham next summer learning a good deal from each other, discussing the transition from an agrarian to an industrial society, and enjoying some of the pleasures of an English summer.